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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25544752">the flood is overwhelming</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kryptonianmenace/pseuds/kryptonianmenace'>kryptonianmenace</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tourette's [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Batman and Robin (Comics), DCU, DCU (Comics), Robin: Son of Batman (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe, Echolalia, Gen, Palilalia, Tourette's Syndrome, coprolalia, copropraxia, echopraxia, palipraxia, tics</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 10:08:51</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>873</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25544752</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kryptonianmenace/pseuds/kryptonianmenace</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It went like this: at the age of sixteen, Damian Wayne started full-body shaking so bad he couldn’t stop. His arms, his legs, his head. There would be days where it waned, or it stopped all together, but it always came back. It had started as shivers and escalated to looking like seizures, but he always remained conscious. He was benched from Robin for safety reasons.</p><p>An AU where Damian has Tourette's but doesn't get diagnosed until he's sixteen.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tourette's [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1851046</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>80</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>All Your Faves Are Neurodivergent And/Or Disabled</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>the flood is overwhelming</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is blatantly based off my own experience with Tourette's, to the point that I made myself cry while writing this. Damian's relationship with the role of Robin after getting the diagnosis is a direct parallel to my relationship to driving.<br/>Damian's tics in this are based off my own!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>“Think of it like a river dam. Every dam has its small leaks. Those small leaks are the tics you had before now, the ones that were missed. But then your dam broke. When a dam breaks, the flood is overwhelming. But it will eventually calm down. We just need to find the right combination of treatment and time for it to do so.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The doctor’s words weren’t reassuring. They only served to infuriate Damian more.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The implication that he had always been like this? That somehow it had been… missed? Ignored?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That it took sixteen years before the problem became known. That he and his family were so unobservant that they couldn’t see it before.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>It went like this: at the age of sixteen, Damian Wayne started full-body shaking so bad he couldn’t stop. His arms, his legs, his head. There would be days where it waned, or it stopped all together, but it always came back. It had started as shivers and escalated to looking like seizures, but he always remained conscious. He was benched from Robin for safety reasons.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They set up an appointment with a doctor as soon as possible, but doctors are specialized for a reason. He had to get a referral for a specialist. The waiting was agonizing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It wasn’t until he was at school, having a panic attack in the hallway about the shaking, that he found a potential solution: a classmate found him panicking and calmed him down. She had recognized his shaking as tics and explained that she had them as well.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>Looking back, he always had small tics.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Echolalia and palilalia were the biggest ones, having to repeat noises he heard and the things he said. The League had tried to beat it out of him - an assassin had to be quiet. His family had encouraged it absent-mindedly - he would mimic the soft ‘woof’ Titus would let out while rough housing, and Dick would mimic him as well, leading to more noises. Jason would encourage him to sound out unfamiliar words over and over until he got them. Tim taught him how to make sounds to distract people while out on the streets as Robin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It extended to his movements, too - echopraxia and palipraxia. This, the League didn’t have as much of a problem with - he used it to perfect his fighting abilities. And with his family? Well, maybe he imitated his father’s manners unintentionally. Or Dick’s. Hell, even Cass’.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had never found it odd. So what if he sometimes felt the urge to let out a small meow, or felt the urge to throw a knife at the wall, for no reason? It just felt right. But apparently it wasn’t just urges, they were tics.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <em>
    <span>“It sounds like you’ve always had a mild case, but now your body has upped the ante due to stress. This is common, our bodies often have severe reactions to stress.”</span>
  </em>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>And then a month after the diagnosis, he was in the bathroom at school, when it slipped out:</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“God </span>
  <em>
    <span>fucking</span>
  </em>
  <span> dammit.”</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Well,</span>
  </em>
  <span> he thought, </span>
  <em>
    <span>looks like the flood’s not done.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>His coprolalia and copropraxia, while new, was not as severe as the rest of his tics.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He never aimed his middle fingers at anyone without intention, but when his fingers flexed involuntarily, he found his hands felt most relaxed with the middle fingers out and the rest curled in. He found it soothing to mutter curse words to himself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And his coprolalia was as multilingual as he was, he discovered. He didn’t know why that surprised him, but it did. The first time he discovered it, he let out a delighted laugh. It was the first time he found amusement in his diagnosis.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>The problem came the first time he tried to go back out on the field as Robin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He thought he could handle it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Key word: he thought.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His father found him hyperventilating on a roof, arms shaking up and down as they ticced from the stress, from the </span>
  <em>
    <span>fear.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>And it was absurd, he knew it was. He had never been afraid before, but now he had new knowledge about himself and he just couldn’t get past the what-ifs. What if his tics acted up in the middle of a fight? What if they caused a perp to get away? What if they cost a civilian their life?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had been </span>
  <em>
    <span>killed</span>
  </em>
  <span> as Robin, and he was more scared about how his tics affected the job.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was pathetic.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <span>It took six panic attacks for Batman to bench him for good.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Barbara sent him her Oracle passwords without him having to ask.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I just want you to know,” she said to him, “I believe you’re still capable of field work. You just need to get past the mental block you put up. You’ll get back out there one day. For now though, you’ll be our Oracle.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And he knew he was capable. He knew it was a mental block.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But that didn’t change the fact that he was no longer Robin.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p>
  <em>
    <span>“But Damian, remember: once a dam breaks, the river can’t go back to the way it was before, even after the flood has calmed. You have Tourette’s. You can’t change that.”</span>
  </em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>
  <a href="https://haljordanisbatman.tumblr.com/">Check out my tumblr!</a>
</p></blockquote></div></div>
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